wfn.org | Pastors needed in Alaska

[NewsDesk@UMCOM.UMC.ORG]

Nov. 21, 2000 News media contact: Thomas S.
McAnally·(615)742-5470·Nashville, Tenn.  0-21-30-71B{524}

NOTE:  A photo is available for use with this story.

By  Mike DuBose*

FAIRBANKS, Alaska (UMNS) -- The Alaska Missionary Conference is looking for
a few good pastors.

It's not just a matter of finding enough people to apply, explains the Rev.
Milo Thornberry, district superintendent and pastor of First United
Methodist Church in Fairbanks. It's finding the right people for a unique
ministry setting.

Alaska is home to just 621,400 people who live in an area one-fifth the size
of the lower 48. Removed not only by distance, they call the rest of the
country "outside."

"Alaska is a magnet for people who have the 'Jackson Hole Syndrome,'"
Thornberry says.

"Some years ago it was discovered that Jackson Hole, Wyoming, had an
unusually high incidence of mental illness. It was found that this location
of idyllic natural beauty was a beacon for people having difficulties
adjusting to life wherever they were.

"It might as well be called the 'Alaska Syndrome' because of Alaska's
reputation for unparalleled pristine beauty," Thornberry says.

Thornberry says some clergy are drawn to Alaska because things are not going
well in their lives. "They have these images of the last frontier, the
pristine wilderness. We need to ask 'do you really want to come to Alaska?'
"

Because United Methodists in Alaska are part of a missionary conference
(there are three in the denomination), the clergy are members of other
conferences. "We have to recruit pastors from outside Alaska to fill our
pastoral openings each year," Thornberry says.

With only 28 congregations representing some 4,000 members in Alaska, it's
impossible to "grow our own," Thornberry says. "That means when clergy who
serve here decide to return to their own annual conferences, we have to find
others."
 
Pastors serving in Alaska deal with different challenges than their peers in
the lower 48.  They include cold temperatures, long, winter darkness, and in
some locations constant rain.  And unlike some sections on the United
States, church going is not as much a way of life in Alaska.  Finally, in a
state with a high cost of living, the minimum salary for United Methodist
clergy is $28,000. None make more than $40,000 a year.

Pastor Mark Born knows first-hand how the Alaska's unique weather affects
people.

"We're coming up on the hibernation part of the year," says Born, part-time
lay pastor of St. Peter the Fisherman United Methodist Church in Ninilchik,
a halibut fishing village on the Kenai Peninsula.

"In the summertime, people just go all the time while the sun's out," Born
says. "Most of the people in the church make their entire living in the
summertime. We see more of people in the winter, though."

The church has 35 to 40 people in worship year-round, Born says. "In the
summer the tourists come in and the fishermen work. The numbers don't
change, but the people do. It's a dynamic group all the time."

"Many times with our smaller churches, we may be the only mainline
Protestant presence in a community," says the Rev. Dennis Holway, district
superintendent and pastor of Turnagain United Methodist Church in Anchorage.
 
"Not many years ago, only about 15% of Alaska's population would admit to
any affiliation with a church," Thornberry says. "What that meant in my
first church in Juneau, a church that had been chartered only a few years
before I arrived, was that over half the congregation had no previous church
experience."

"Actually, I found that to be quite refreshing. They had not learned some of
the bad habits that can come with lifetimes of taking the church for granted
and were excited about possibilities in worship that were new to me." 

They were interested in studying the Bible and didn't bring with them a lot
of the baggage of assumptions of how they 'ought' to view it.

Thornberry says that Disciple Bible Studies have been the heart of
"discipling" people to new faith and the church.

"The difference between a good choice and a bad choice, we believe, has more
to do with who you are and your expectations than with the Alaska setting.
Before deciding that you are called to Alaska consider, if you have a
family, whether they believe they are called," Thornberry says.

"Taking an appointment in the Alaska Missionary Conference is not for
everyone. But for the few who sense a special call to ministry in this
context, there is truly no other place like it in the world."

For more information, contact New Clergy,  Alaska Missionary Conference,
3402 Wesleyan Drive, Anchorage, AK 99508; tel.  (907) 333-5050; or e-mail to
umc@alaska.net. 

#  #  #

*DuBose is a photojournalist on the staff of United Methodist News Service.

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United Methodist News Service
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